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Heston Blumenthal's good oil on pantry staples

Spring clean your pantry with these tips from celebrity-chef Heston Blumenthal.

Callan Boys
Callan Boys

Heston Blumenthal: 'There's no point hoarding pantry items that go unused because they just get worse over time.'
Heston Blumenthal: 'There's no point hoarding pantry items that go unused because they just get worse over time.'Penny Stephens

As the number of items in a pantry grows, the volume per cubic cupboard metre stays the same until the next renovation or house move. This is a problem. My pantry is chockers with once-used spices, truffle-flavoured everything, and more infused oil than you can shake a cinnamon stick at. Some of it gifted, some of it purchased for a recipe that was either too disastrous or too difficult to cook again.

Every spice-rummaging session is like an episode of This Is Your Life.

"Remember the orange blossom water that suffered from overuse during your 2009 Moroccan phase? Well here it is! And just to the left of it is the bottle of lime-infused oil Aunt Frances gifted you three years ago. And on the third shelf, hiding behind your old pals expired-Worcestershire and sticky-bottomed-soy is a little Kampot-pepper pot, which travelled in your suitcase all the way from Cambodia just to be here today."

Heston is no fan of pomegranate molasses.
Heston is no fan of pomegranate molasses.Marina Oliphant
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British celebrity-chef Heston Blumenthal is man with a pantry like the rest of us. His Fat Duck restaurant (which is moving to Melbourne for six months in February) retained its three Michelin stars again this year, so Blumenthal is reasonably qualified to comment on whether these hardly used items hogging pantry real estate have any merit.

During a recent visit to Australia to promote his Coles Christmas range, he sat down with goodfood.com.au to share some kitchen clean-up tips.

As a rule of thumb, Blumenthal suggests throwing unused pantry items in the bin (or your recycling receptacle of choice) if not used for a few months.

Flavoured salts: into the bin.
Flavoured salts: into the bin.Eddie Jim

"With all of these things, if you haven't used something for months, there's a reason for that, so you might as well chuck it," he says.

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"There's no point hoarding pantry items that go unused because they just get worse over time."

Flavoured salts

Bay leaves: grow your own.
Bay leaves: grow your own.Marina Oliphant

Every Christmas I'm given another set of flavoured salts that go unused. How many chips do relatives think I'm eating? If I want a kick of rosemary on my spuds, the fresh stuff will be just fine, thank you.

Blumenthal says he wouldn't bother using flavoured salts at all, even though he has been guilty of making them in the past.

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"I got a bit too excited for my first product line at [British supermarket] Waitrose and did a rose and coriander salt," he says. "Why, I'll never never know, but at least I can admit that to myself!"

VERDICT: Into the bin!

Infused oils

"Infused oils, most of the time, I'd just throw away," Blumenthal says.

"A lot of them go rancid quite quickly and smell weird. They just sit at the back of the shelf and develop that horrible surface slime. The exception is chilli oil, which is quite good."

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VERDICT: Bin the orange-mocha-chocolate types, hold the chilli.

Truffle oil

"I'd smell it first before deciding to throw it or keep it. How long it keeps depends on the quality of the truffle oil," Blumenthal says. "Truffle is one of those flavours that kills everything else if you use too much of it. It's similar to tarragon - a fantastic herb but you've got to use it really sparingly."

VERDICT: If it's a good quality, use a dash in your potato mash. Most belong at the tip, though.

Bay leaves

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The home cook might use a bay leaf once a week - probably more in winter, definitely less summer. Most cupboards are never short of shrivelled bay leaves that flavour has long abandoned. The pile is only added to when a recipe calls for fresh leaves. You can only buy them in bulk and you only need to use one.

Blumenthal's solution to avoid disintegrating bay leaves is simple:

"Buy your own bay tree," he says.

Very well, then.

VERDICT: Either channel your inner Don Burke and dry bay leaves in small batches or cook more stews before the dried leaves lose their potency (about a year).

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Rose water

"You only need to use so little of it," he says. "I think they should sell rose water in 15-millilitre bottles because most of the time it just sits in your cupboard taking up space.

"It's in all the historic English cooking," he says. "There was a 300-year period where rose water was added to just about everything."

VERDICT: Rose water brands vary in longevity, so best give the bottle a sniff to see if it's still smelling like, err, roses.

Pomegranate molasses

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At the mention of this ruby red syrup, Blumenthal makes a face that looks like he's bit into raw garlic.

"Throw it out!" he exclaims. "Never go to anywhere you can pick that up in the first place."

VERDICT: Bin or feel Heston's pomegranate wrath!

Flavoured mustard

Mustards that are wasabi flavoured or truffle infused: do they have any value in a salad dressing or on a sandwich, or should they be placed back under the Christmas tree (probably without a tag and on hand to gift neighbours bearing unexpected Bunnings vouchers).

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"There's a stout flavoured mustard that's actually pretty good," Blumenthal says. "So it depends on the mustard whether it's worth holding on to or not.

"However, you should always stock a wholegrain and a dijon in your pantry," he adds.

VERDICT: Keep the stout flavoured variety, regift the wasabi flavoured one to the postman.

Coconut oil

I mention to Blumenthal I did the paleo diet for a month and now there's a jar of coconut oil in my cupboard I have no use for.

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"What's the paleo diet?" he asks.

I tell him followers of the diet suggest we eat like our Neanderthal ancestors because our digestive systems have not evolved to handle many foods of the modern age. The more hardcore versions involve eating a lot raw food.

This information prompts Blumenthal to raise an eyebrow.

"Raw vegetables are OK if you blitz them and make a juice, but the human digestive system can't break down cellulose in raw plants [like other animals]," he says. "We're not designed to do that, we don't climb trees any more."

Blumenthal is a fan of the "healthy" coconut oil beloved by paleo-dieters (or paleo lifestylers, if you will), and says it's good to use in protein shakes.

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VERDICT: Add a tablespoon to a protein shake if, like Heston, you're prone to a bit of extra fuel before a biceps curling.

And the pantry items you should always have well stocked?

"Salt, [non-flavoured] mustard, and vinegar," says Blumenthal, who believes chef's don't think about mustard and vinegar as often as they should.

"We talk about seasoning and salt a lot, but we don't think about acidity enough. We really don't.

"Most sauces can do with a bit of mustard and vinegar for acidity. Even just a tiny drop, small enough you won't even taste the mustard. We describe food as being mouth watering as a positive thing and it's acidity that generates that saliva."

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Blumenthal also advocates a having a number of different vinegars on hand.

"A white wine vinegar, a red wine vinegar, sherry vinegar, and a maybe tarragon vinegar," he says.

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Callan BoysCallan Boys is editor of SMH Good Food Guide, restaurant critic for Good Weekend and Good Food writer.

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